The more elite Kama-sutra and Ananga-ranga argued that erotic manuals ensured wives stayed faithful to their husbands.

Illustration/Devdutt Pattanaik

Cave paintings in India, some dating to 10,000 BC, show men and women with exaggerated genitals, indulging in sexual acts, women birthing babies, and men and women dancing in joy, even indulging in orgies as well as sexual violence. Harappan cities, with their standardisation and regulated cities, seem too austere to be linked with romance or pleasure. But the women were bejewelled, and they did eat spicy oily food, and wrapped themselves in brightly coloured cotton fabrics. So, pleasure was clearly part of their life.

It is in the Veda that India’s pleasure (kama) heritage is first articulated very clearly. Here, desire is the seed of the mind that incepts creativity. Atharva Veda says, “Desire gives. Desire receives”.........

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